Conservatives closing the gap on reform

Unfortunately I think social media is shaping minds, hardly anyone reads these days. The amount of people who say they want Trump but if you know many Americans....they want rid of him. It's no surprise that Trump is building his own loyal military to do his bidding. All the old generals are being replaced by people willing to break international law. Look at history and you will find that it's a card played by all dictators. So we will see what happens when American democracy tries to remove him.

British people need to wake up and start reading about history. Learn about the lives of working class people during the industrial revolution and how much we have achieved. The likes of Reform would roll back the clock on many things we actually take for granted but a 100 years ago we never had.

Universal healthcare paid through taxation should never be given up. Nor should we accept that breaking international law is ok as long as it achieves an objective.

If we honestly value christianity then we should live by it's values. You can't pick and choose which values you want to keep. I'm afraid our friend Trump is no Christian despite his talk, money is his religion.

I think the British people should actually think about all the things they should be proud of and why we shouldn't be talking of scrapping things like free education and health-care.

Yes 100% but for some reason, many think we need more of their failed experiments.

I think nothing shows the Tories for what they are than their pre election unfunded NI cut, not done as an election bribe but to fuck up the incoming Labour Govt... but of course who did it really screw up? not Labour but us, the UK - they simply don't care.

Power is all that matters, they and their supporters have a 4/5 year plan to get back in and they will do anything to make it work.

The problem I have with the conservative party is they will just increase the already growing gap between the poorest and the wealthy.

We have had decades of conservative rule since the 1970s. The Labour party have had very little time in power and yet they are blamed for all of today's problems.

It was Boris Johnson that allowed immigration from other countries as the doors closed on the European Union.

It was Thatcher that sold off the water , electric and gas , telecommunication companies. She sold off council housing and led to creation of new social landlords....which really are just private landlords.

Here is the situation, you have growing inequality and a huge gap in skills. This requires huge amounts of investment in training and education and there's only one way to achieve this and that involves using tax payers money to focus on further education and training. It's the only way to get people into well paid work and off welfare.

Same as healthcare, the NHS needs a trillion pounds to resolve the problems long term...... failure to invest now will only mean paying later on. Poor health outcomes costs billions in welfare later on.

When people start saying healthcare is unaffordable for the masses then please take a look at Africa or South America.....then say you want that here. Even in America healthcare is becoming a luxury.....

Thank you, appreciated@IMissTheLittleBluePackets merry Christmas to you also 🎄

Thanks @Justchilling07 I really appreciate that and return the sentiment. Merry Christmas 🎄

@IMissTheLittleBluePackets yes, l think l’ve got a bit carried away myself.I do get what you’re saying, l agree, l know l definitely haven’t got all the answers, sometimes l get a bit carried away on threads.But yes thank you, for your calm and thoughtful response, apologies for my last one.

@Justchilling07 you could run her last sentence through any sentiment analysis software you could find, and it would be deemed snotty at best.

As soon as people adopt that superior attitude when talking politics, it just winds me up and admittedly, I lose all respect for them. I don't know why we can't be respectful on these threads. Nobody has all the answers.

@BIossomtoes yes, l really hope so.

Farage is a one off. He is Reform, it would fizzle out without him.

Yes, completely agree, unfortunately though, there would be another one to take his place.It’s just a recipe for disaster!

Hmm, the expression, "The pot calling the kettle black” comes to mind, eg, it’s ok for you to say what you want, which of course it is, however if anyone has a different opinion to yours 😱you don’t like it, you then turn it around, you’re right the other person must be wrong Hypocrisy at its finest!! @IMissTheLittleBluePackets

Completely agree. He’s a disruptor who wouldn’t know where to start.

I would bet that shoukd the Tory & Reform go into a coalition Farage would last about 3 months before throwing his toys out of the pram. His ego would never allow him to govern jointly with anyone else...

That was 60 odd years ago, they all dead, surely you cannot cling to things that happened a life time ago to any present political party.

I mean where would that end?

The devaluation went from $2.80 to $2.40 have you seen what the £/$ rate is today?

@Abhannmor My point was that Harold Wilson tried to fool us into thinking that devaluation would not affect us. He took us for fools.

Have you tried using AI? It can help you gather and organise information.

Sure! I’m happy to share when I've gathered enough to make sense of it and once I have something useful. I’m working through things bit by bit, so it’ll take a little time to separate the messy records from the noise.

In the meantime, the things that have helped me get a clearer picture are:

• checking what each party has actually delivered locally where they've had power.

• looking at their voting record rather than just the headline promises.

• paying attention to who funds them and who actually influences their decisions.

• comparing what they’re saying now with what they’ve done before.

It’s still a lot to sift through, but those filters make it a bit easier to separate the PR from the reality. If you use this, you'll probably get a clearer picture too, even if we end up choosing differently.

Mrs Thatcher devalues the pound more than Wilson did , simply by letting it float. Down to its real value in relation to other currency.

I’m not totally sure yet. I’m still doing a deep‑dive into each party’s policies, what they’ve actually delivered (even at grassroots level), and who’s really shaping their decisions behind the scenes, not just the visible leaders. I don't think it will be easy to do but for me it’ll come down to whichever party has the most balanced and consistent approach overall, not just a list of promises as usual.

If you don't vote tactically then you'll end up with reform. So while I agree voting with conviction is the right thing to do the problem with it is it dilutes the vote and you end up with something you really don't want.

Notice that Reform are no longer talking about immigration. It's mainly down to the fact that the problem is actually being dealt with. Now they are focused on the unemployed, the public servants, the NHS.... anything that is funded by the tax payer.

If we lose these services who will actually benefit? It won't be the middle class, certainly won't be the working class. The tax savings to someone under 100k a year will be so small that you will barely notice. In return you'll be spending more to replace the lost services from the private sector.... don't believe me look at Dentistry and Social Care. They reduced the funding model and look at what has happened.

Why aren't we talking about the real problems this country faces.

Unfortunately, until we get PR, then thats the way it is.

The next Govt, like this current one will be voted in on a small minority of the electorate, around 25%, if that.

How Labour can preside over this, i don't know.